“Tell me of Jeremy’s death.” Her voice held so much more command than she had expected.
“Lilias.” Very carefully, Hawthorne drew himself upright. “Perhaps we should discuss whatever has overset you.” The patronizing tone set her teeth on edge.
“Stop.” The pistol jumped in her hand, but didn’t discharge, thank goodness. The wood was cool against her skin, the pearl inlay warm. Irony, wasn’t it, that she pointed Jeremy’s own pistol at Hawthorne? “Don’t treat me like an imbecile. We’ve known each other a long time—for good or ill. You owe me the truth.”
His breath seemed slow and steady. Why was hers ricocheting around in her lungs?
“I’m not certain what the issue is, Lilias. Why don’t you enlighten me?”
An awful shuddering pain worked its way from the pit of her stomach to her throat. She hadn’t expected the betrayal to be twice as bad this time. It was worse. Instead of a ghost betraying her, it was a flesh and blood man. One that could both bleed and die.
“Jeremy was living a second life. A secret one.” She did not say assassin. Could not. Despite the anger and fear roiling in her, she kept the word inside. If Hawthorne was one of them, he didn’t need the word. He would already know. “The things he did were horrible, and he might have been murdered for them.”
Hawthorne’s intake of breath was as discordant as the gunshot would have been. “You cannot be serious.”
“You were the man most often in his company, and you were there when he was injured. You brought him to me. Therefore, I must ask what you know. And I must ask how Jeremy was wounded. Exactly.”
“Murder.” He said the word as though it were foreign, his pupils dilating. He did not answer her question. “A second life. Impossible.”
“Don’t play games with me.” Her hand shook. She struggled to steady it and the pistol. The lump forming in her throat burned. “I have proof. It’s true. And I have to believe you were working with him.”
“I—” Jason lurched in the carriage seat, like a child’s marionette. “No.”
She set her finger to the trigger as tears gathered. She blinked, refusing to let them fall. “Tell me what happened when he died. Tell me all of it.”
“I feel as though I’ve been dropped into a storybook.” He raked a hand through his hair. “I’ve told you already. It was a French soldier. A sabre cut.”
“It was a French soldier, or it looked like a French soldier?” Anyone could put on soldier’s garb. She had done so herself.
“My God.” Hawthorne stared at her, as though he had never quite seen her before. “I don’t know if he truly was a French soldier. It was a bloody battlefield. I was a hundred yards away, fighting a damned soldier myself. I saw a man in a blue coat. I saw the sabre.” He stopped, licked his lips. They were chapped. “It was a battlefield.”
There was no answer there, and she wanted answers. Some part of her knew that there may never be an explanation. But this was the only man that could provide her one, and he was giving her nothing.
Straightening her arm, she aimed the pistol at Jason’s head. Her stomach churned and her heart pumped wildly beneath her stays.
“Where did you go last night?”
His brows careened together, as though shocked by the change in subject. His eyes darted toward the pistol. “I was at the ball. You were there, too. I saw you.”
“After the ball. I saw you speak with someone and then get into your carriage. It was the height of the engagement. You should have stayed for a while yet.”
“I had to meet someone.”
“Not good enough.” She wasn’t certain how she had the courage to keep the pistol so steady.
“Lilias.” His eyes were dark as they flickered over her face, then to the pistol. His tone softened to a whisper. “I have a daughter. She was ill.”
“A—a daughter?” Shock wasn’t a gentle wave. It was a deluge. “But you had a pistol.”
“I’m ashamed to say I haven’t the blunt to keep my daughter and her mother properly. I’ve enough to keep them from being hungry, to keep a roof over their heads. But not enough to put that roof in Mayfair. I carry the pistol against footpads when I visit them.” Humiliation flushed his cheeks beneath the night’s growth of beard. His hand reached out, then fell back into his lap. “My daughter is ill, and I needed to be with her. I have only just returned.”
The unshaven jaw, the mismatched coat buttons. His tired face. They all fell into place.
“Why did you never tell me?”
“A man doesn’t tell a lady about his bastards.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I don’t know what the hell is going on, Lilias. I don’t know anything about murder or double lives.” What was truth? What was a lie? She could not tell. But his eyes were full of simultaneous shock and compassion. He ran his hand over the stubble on his jaw, but it did nothing to erase the haggard expression. Or the pull of his heavy, tired lids.
She couldn’t believe it of him. She just couldn’t.
Hawthorne was no assassin. If he was, he likely would have tried to kill her by now.
The gun fell to her lap. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. The rumble of passing carriages nearly drowned out her words.
“Lilias.” Hawthorne half rose in his seat, as though to approach her. But there was nowhere to go within the confines of the hackney. “Tell me what’s happened. This is not like you.” Then his lips quirked. “I take it back. It is like you. I just didn’t expect it within the civilized confines of London.”
“I don’t feel civilized.” She felt numb, even as her chest ached and her belly roiled. “I can’t tell you the details. If you don’t already know—” She broke off and shook her head. “Tell me more of his death.”
“I don’t understand how that will change anything.” When she only watched him steadily, he sighed in resignation. “It was after the heavy cavalry charge led by Uxbridge. Losses were significant, though the charge was successful. Some of the heavy cavalry lost its cohesion, but we kept control of ours and mounted a countercharge. We couldn’t rein in the men. I saw him fall—Lilias. What do you think he has done?”
She gritted her teeth. “Tell me the rest.”
“I watched Jeremy fall. It was a sabre cut across his chest, another on his thigh. You saw the wounds yourself. He fell from the horse, but his foot was tangled in the stirrup. I—” He stopped, swallowed. “I managed to catch the animal before Jeremy was dragged too far.”
She hissed out a breath. She couldn’t help it. There had been much worse on the battlefield—she’d inflicted worse on her enemies. But she’d seen that battlefield. Jeremy would have been dragged over uneven ground. Over the bodies of other men. She closed her eyes, but the image was stark against the darkness of her lids.
“And so I brought him away from the battlefield,” Hawthorne finished.
“I remember when the note came to the farm where I was staying.” Pain could have twin forces. Death and betrayal. Loss and lies. “Major Fairchild has fallen. That was all the note said.” She saw again the grim face of the soldier that had brought the news before he returned to the front. Then there had been the hard ride to the battlefield.
And she remembered the gray face of the man she’d married and the bloody sabre cut across his chest. She choked, and the tears began to drop onto her fisted hands.
“Oh, Lilias.” Hawthorne drew her in, his arms coming around her. “I wish you would explain.”
Strong. Comforting. A friend’s arms. Arms she could trust. Burying her face into his shoulder, she let tears of loss flow, exorcising the second round of grief that accompanied the second loss of her husband.
As her tears dried, she realized he was a little awkward about holding her, as though he couldn’t quite figure out where to put his hands and still observe propriety. She smiled. Wiping the tears from her cheeks, she pulled away.
Catherine was right. He was a good man.
“Jeremy did horrible things, Hawthorne. Horrible. The life he lived—well. It wasn’t what I thought.”
“Whatever acts you believe he’s committed, it must be a mistake.” He sounded so certain.
“He lied. Everything was a lie.” She hated to shatter Hawthorne’s certainty. “He was never where he said he’d be. He would meet with strange people, men watched where we slept. He would jump at the slightest noise, he was often worried. He hid things from me.”
“He was a soldier at war. He had to protect the woman he loved, not to mention command his men. He might have hidden the worst of war from you, but he was always honorable.”
Her fingers convulsed around the pistol. Hawthorne was wrong. Jeremy was anything but honorable.
—
THE ADDER’S GAZE did not leave the unmarked carriage carrying Lilias. He really would have to ensure his men killed her now. She was beyond a slight danger to him and had fallen into the realm of deadly. Not because of the weapon, but because of her unpredictability.
She was ever a surprise. He had learned that long ago.
The carriage stopped at the doors of Fairchild House. He had been waiting for her to return. She must have instructed the coachman to drive around or he would not have arrived before her.
He saw her fingers first as she set them into the footman’s assisting hand. Her gloves matched the dull gray of her pelisse. An odd choice for her. Gray was not her best color. Scarlet was her color. Not the bright cherry red the debutantes wore, but the deep, vivid red that pulsed with energy and passion.
He couldn’t smell her from across the street, but he knew her scent. Lust. Sex. Ready as ripe fruit waiting to be plucked. He went hard just thinking of it. Of her. It had always been her. He’d tried to pretend she wasn’t a weakness, but he dreamed of her.
Desperate hunger tore through him as he pictured her face when he plunged into her. It was an old fantasy. She would wrap her legs around him, grip his shoulders with her long, elegant fingers. He knew the passion she hid beneath her curves. He wanted it. Under his hands. Under his body. His breathing grew ragged. Raw. Something dark clawed in him. His hands fisted and he imagined her hips beneath his fingers. Imagined driving himself into her, harder and harder, until she screamed with it.
He couldn’t quite breathe. He was hard as stone and damn near spilling his seed in his breeches. But he could still see her across the cobblestone street, even with the haze of lust clouding his vision. He’d almost forgotten her pistol in his violent need, but the watery sunlight caught the glint of metal.
He beat back his hunger and narrowed his eyes, focusing on the metal peeking between her glove and the dull fabric of her pelisse. She was hiding the weapon from the footman as she glided up the front steps.
It was her husband’s pistol. He recognized the pearl-handled weapon easily enough. It was too big to fit in her reticule, so at least she couldn’t carry it everywhere without being seen. Even inside Fairchild House, she could not hide it. But it was still a dangerous weapon wielded by a woman with a volatile temper and little fear.
To be aimed at him, when she chose.
The price on her head would increase. A woman with a weapon and the willingness to kill could not be allowed to find him. Yet he could not kill her himself. Even a hint of his involvement and his career, his reputation, would be forfeit.
He’d issued his orders, but the Adders had yet to strike. They were biding their time, waiting for an opportunity to make her death appear as an accident.
But he couldn’t afford to wait for a convenient opportunity.
Chapter 21
“SHALL I TAKE your pelisse, Mrs. Fairchild?” The butler closed the door of Fairchild House and reached for her outerwear in a vain attempt to do his job.
“Thank you, Graves, but I will be going back out in a few moments.” Lilias moved away, keeping her hand to the side and out of view. She was lying through her teeth. She needed the pelisse to hide the pistol. “I shall keep my pelisse on.”
Graves sent her the silent stare butlers excelled at. “As you wish, ma’am.” He disappeared into the quiet recesses of Fairchild House, leaving Lilias alone in the hall.
She looked down at the butt of the weapon. Delicate pearl flowed from a warm cream to a pale yellow, then back again. Such a pretty color. It had felt alive in her hand when she aimed it at Hawthorne. She couldn’t decide if that terrified her or not.
“Oh, good,” Catherine trilled. “You’re back.”
Lilias jumped a foot at least. Thumping her pounding chest with her free hand, she turned around as Catherine brushed past her.
“Do come into the salon, dear,” the older woman said, traipsing through the open door.
“Ah. Hm.” She couldn’t go into the salon to chat with Jeremy’s pistol still clutched in her hand. Thank goodness she had been facing the other way. Catherine had not seen the weapon.
Catherine’s turbaned head poked around the doorjamb. “Well?” She blinked. “Are you coming?”
“Yes, of course. Just for a moment.” She didn’t enter the room, but hovered in the doorway.
“I wanted to talk to you about attending the opera.” Catherine settled into a spindly chair with curved legs.
“Yes?” She could barely concentrate with the blasted pistol behind her back. It felt as though she were waving a flag behind her—one that was embroidered with the word Lie.
“I do so want to see Miss Byrne in The Beggar’s Opera.” Catherine pulled a basket from beside the chair. She rummaged through it and pulled out her latest embroidery project. White curls bounced around her face. “Perhaps Grant’s box is available tomorrow evening. Unless, of course, you have a previous engagement with Angelstone?”
“Angelstone?” She nearly dropped the pistol.
“You haven’t come to that type of understanding then, have you?” Catherine’s eyes lit from within. “Then you’re still in that lovely phase where you are having fun.”
Lilias sighed and closed her eyes. She needed one moment of quiet thought. One moment. She couldn’t balance assassinations and pistols and operas with the logistics of an affair. When she opened her eyes, Catherine was regarding her with amusement.
“Have fun with that rake, darling.” Catherine’s needle poked through a swatch of thin linen. “There aren’t very many of his type around.”
Footsteps rang on the hall floor. Lilias whirled, still trying to keep the damn pistol hidden from the front door and Catherine.
Graves set his hand on the front door handle, waiting. He had a sixth sense for visitors. A moment later, a quick rhythm was knocked out on the front door. Graves waited just the right amount of time before pulling open the door. A draft of cool fresh air blew into the hall.
Three women stood on the steps. They were decked in jaunty hats and military-style pelisses, though one of them wore the most garish shade of pink. Curls of mahogany and gray and blond-brown waved in the wind.
“The Dowager Marchioness of Angelstone, Elise, Lady Angelstone and Mrs. Whitmore.” The oldest of the three ladies held out a card for Graves, looking as harsh as any British general. She stopped, her hand in midair, when she spied Lilias.
Lovely. Just lovely. Angel’s family had come for an unexplained social call when she was still idiotically holding Jeremy’s pistol and trying to hide it from Catherine. As though threatening a man with a pistol wasn’t enough excitement for the day. She needed to dispose of the weapon. Quickly. Before someone noticed she was acting as though she belonged in Bedlam.
Graves cleared his throat. He would have normally put the ladies in a salon while he checked to see if Lilias and Catherine were at home and receiving callers. But here she was. Clearly at home.
Devil take it. She couldn’t disappear with the pistol while the Whitmores stared at her from the do
orstep.
“Lady Angelstone,” she called to the dowager. “Please. Come in. We are most certainly at home.” Sweat slicked her palms and dampened the inside of her gloves. She didn’t know the Whitmores aside from the briefest of acquaintance at the concert. There was no reason these women would come to call.
No reason but Angel.
The three women on the doorstep of Fairchild House moved into the entryway. Skirts rustled, boots clicked on the floor. The scent of rain came with them and she saw that the sky had clouded over. A storm hung in the air.
Catherine whispered from just beyond the salon door. “Do you know them? I have not been introduced.”
Lilias shook her head and hoped the dowager couldn’t hear her mother-in-law.
“I don’t think one is supposed to call on her son’s paramour.” Catherine’s whisper quieted as she returned to her seat. “I wonder what they could want?”
“I can only imagine,” Lilias muttered. Raising her voice, she said, “Please, join us in the salon.”
The dowager’s sharp eyes scanned Lilias’s pelisse, the entry, the paintings, the stair. One quick glance to take it all in. Behind her, the other two ladies watched Lilias with bright-eyed curiosity. The brunette was pretty in that soft, round, comforting way. She’d been amused at the concert. The other wore the hideously pink pelisse and studied Lilias with narrowed eyes.
Lilias had, apparently, become a display. Irritation pricked. Still, she pasted a gracious smile on her face. “Please,” she said again, gesturing into the salon.
She waited as the three visitors walked into the salon, her frantic gaze bouncing around the hall. She still had the pistol to hide. With the vigilant Graves remaining in the entry, there was nothing she could do.
Disaster loomed on the horizon.
Catherine, bless her, was already welcoming their guests. “We are quite pleased to have you join us. Lilias has just arrived from—” Catherine’s voice faltered.
“A walk,” Lilias filled in. “My apologies, I have not yet removed my pelisse.” All eyes turned her way. Four gazes started at her head, moved down to her feet, then back up again. Well. Now she had to remove her outerwear. And she had to distract them. “We were just remarking upon Lady Milbanke’s concert. Catherine, didn’t you mention how much you enjoyed it?”
In Bed with a Spy Page 15